Philosophical Definitions: A Pragmatic Approach

Abstract

In this paper, I argue for a pragmatic theory of the motivations behind the practice of defining concepts in philosophy. The “correct” definition in philosophy is not, as is usually supposed, the definition that accurately describes some pre-philosophical meaning, but the definition which is useful for the achievement of certain theoretical goals. I consider different examples of definitional debates from the history of philosophy. The analysis of these examples also evidences why philosophers do not usually grant the incidence of pragmatic reason in their conceptual investigations. At the end of the paper, I provide some reasons that explain why the incidence of pragmatic reasons is inevitable.